A war and its fearsome consequences: How the world has changed
post-Iraq

By Anne Penketh, The Independent, 13 December 2005

President Bush said yesterday that ‘the year 2005 will be a
turning point in the history of freedom’. But since the start of
the war the days have been littered with unintended consequences.

Iran

The Iraqi elections provided a classic illustration of the law of
unintended consequences: the Americans overthrew the hated dictator,
Saddam Hussein, only to see the rise of religious Shia leaders loyal
to Iran, which is now ruled by a fanatical hardline president Mahmoud
Ahmedinejad. Iraq's Sunni-dominated neighbours are alarmed. Iran
has been accused by Britain of stirring up trouble across the border
in Iraq, where soldiers in the southhave fallen victim to bomb
attacks. After President Bush encouraged Iranians to vote for reform,
it was the hardline mayor of Tehran who was voted in as
president. President Bush's public dismissal of the Iranian
election, the day before the first round of voting, as “an
electoral process that ignores the basic requirements of
democracy”, may have been responsible for a large turnout.

Torture/Rendition

America's attitude to security changed after the events of 11
September 2001. But the Bush administration's tolerance of methods
explicitly banned by the UN convention on torture has raised a chorus
of protests from human rights organisations as the US continues its
“war on terror” by flying suspects around the world to a
network of secret prisons. It found its most revolting expression in
the abuse at Abu Ghraib. The US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice,
says that the US does not condone torture, although she recognises
abuse will happen. One of the unintended consequences of President
Bush's stance is that it has brought alliances with unusual
bedfellows, such as the dictatorship of Uzbekistan, whose President
has opponents boiled to death, in the interests of the “war on
terror”.

Egypt

Must be President Bush's greatest disappointment, after his call
for greater democracy backfired. After publicly urging President Hosni
Mubarak, Egypt's veteran leader, to loosen the grip of the ruling
party on power, the big winners in the parliamentary election were the
Islamic fundamentalists of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Egyptian
government made no secret of its fear that the alternative to the
ruling National Democratic Party was chaos. The NDP was the victor in
the parliamentary elections, but voting brought the death of at least
one opposition supporter and mass arrests. In the event, the NDP
remained the dominant party as expected but the Muslim Brotherhood,
forced to run its MPs as independent candidates, increased its power
in parliament nearly sixfold.

Terrorism

Tony Blair was fond of saying before the Iraq war that he feared the
nexus of weapons of mass destruction and terrorists coming together to
threaten global security. Yet there was never any proof of the alleged
link between Saddam Hussein and al-Qa’ida. Terror has surged in
Iraq since the war, with Islamic groups beheading hostages and seizing
foreigners and Iraqis at will to hold them to ransom. The Sunni and
foreign-led insurgency has been able to swell its ranks in large
swaths of Iraq where the US-led coalition does not venture, and cross
the border at will. A majority of Iraqis questioned by a BBC poll said
that the situation in their country was “bad” and 75 per
cent said that they wanted restoring public security to be the
priority of the new government, due to be formed after this week's
elections.

Syria/Lebanon

Pressure from the US to co-operate in quelling the insurgency in the
aftermath of the Iraq war may end up destabilising the Syrian
President, Bashir al-Assad, who has already been weakened politically
by the forced withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon. The
assassination of the anti-Syrian former Lebanese president Rafiq
Hariri cast further doubt on the stability of the region, as car bombs
targeting other anti-Syrian figures seem to be blasting Lebanon back
into civil war after the democratic elections held last May. Much as
the Americans may welcome the departure of the regime in Syria, which
is still on the State Department's terror list, further
instability in the tinderbox region on Iraq's doorstep would be a
nightmare for the Bush administration.

America

America's standing in the world, and the President's
popularity ratings, have plummeted in the 1,000 days since the war
began, despite initial public support for the invasion. With close
aides now under investigation by a special prosecutor, President Bush
has been haunted by the decision to go to war after ignoring warnings
from the intelligence community about the nature of Iraq's
threat. His approval ratings last month stood at 37 per cent, the
lowest of his presidency, although they slightly improved this
month. Iraq is seen as the factor influencing the negative
slide. Global opinion polls show that anti-American sentiment in
Europe, the Middle East and Asia surged as a result of the Iraq
war. Solid majorities in Muslim countries have a negative opinion of
America.

Middle East

George Bush and Tony Blair explicitly linked the aftermath of the Iraq
war to the broader goal of seeking peace in the Middle East to
envisage a “viable” two-state solution for Israelis and
Palestinians. But one unintended consequence is that the Israeli
government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has forged ahead with his
own solution, involving the construction of a fence that encroaches
into Palestinian land in defiance of international law. The
Palestinians fear that if Mr Sharon's breakaway party is
victorious in Israeli elections, he will seek to impose a new border
which will annex East Jerusalem as well as significant tracts of the
West Bank. Meanwhile, when the Palestinian parliamentary elections are
held next month, the Islamic militants of Hamas are expected to do
well.

Weapons

George Bush and Tony Blair said before the war that they wanted to rid
Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. Not only have none been found
inside Iraq, but the war could have actually triggered the spread of
such weapons. The overthrow of Saddam Hussein may well have been the
factor that pushed the Iranian government into taking a strategic
decision to develop a nuclear weapon, even though the Iranians insist
that their nuclear programme is peaceful. It had been clear to all
that North Korea had been spared attack because of its possession of
the bomb while Saddam was known not to have succeeded in building
one. So countries may have decided to take out their own insurance
policy. Israel is beefing up its own security after the perceived
Iranian threat. The Iraq war may have set off a new nuclear arms race.